The message was clear. The only way Leyel could remain part of Deet's life was if he became part of her new "family" at the library. Well, she could forget that idea. If she chose to get swallowed up in that place, fine. If she chose to leave him for a bunch of indexers and cataloguers-- fine. Fine. No. It wasn't fine. He wanted to talk to her. Right now, at this moment, he wanted to tell her what he was thinking, wanted her to question him and argue with him until she made him come up with an answer, or lots of answers. He needed her to see what he wasn't seeing. He needed her a lot more than they needed her.
He was out amid the thick pedestrian traffic of Maslo Boulevard before he realized that this was the first time since Hari's funeral that he'd ventured beyond the immediate neighborhood of his apartment. It was the first time in months that he'd had anyplace to go. That's what I'm doing here, he thought. I just need a change of scenery, a sense of destination. That's the only reason I'm heading to the library. All that emotional nonsense back in the apartment, that was just my unconscious strategy for making myself get out among people again.
Leyel was almost cheerful when he got to the Imperial Library. He had been there many times over the years, but always for receptions or other public events-- having his own high-capacity lector meant that he could get access to all the library's records by cable. Other people-- students, professors from poorer schools, lay readers-- they actually had to come here to read. But that meant that they knew their way around the building. Except for flnding the major lecture halls and reception rooms, Leyel hadn't the faintest idea where anything was.
For the first time it dawned on him how very large the Imperial Library was. Deet had mentioned the numbers many times-- a staff of more than five thousand, including machinists, carpenters, cooks, security, a virtual city in itself-- but only now did Leyel realize that this meant that many people here had never met each other. Who could possibly know five thousand people by name? He couldn't just walk up and ask for Deet by name. What was the department Deet worked in? She had changed so often, moving through the bureaucracy.
Everyone he saw was a patron-- people at lectors, people at catalogues, even people reading books and magazines printed on paper. Where were the librarians? The few staff members moving through the aisles turned out not to be librarians at all-- they were volunteer docents, helping newcomers learn how to use the lectors and catalogues. They knew as little about library staff as he did.
He finally found a room full of real librarians, sitting at calculators preparing the daily access and circulation reports. When he tried to speak to one, she merely waved a hand at him. He thought she was telling him to go away until he realized that her hand remained in the air, a finger pointing to the front of the room. Leyel moved toward the elevated desk where a fat, sleepy-looking middle-aged woman was lazily paging through long columns of figures, which stood in the air before her in military formation.
"Sorry to interrupt you," he said softly. She was resting her cheek on her hand. She didn't even look at him when he spoke. But she answered. "I pray for interruptions."
Only then did he notice that her eyes were framed with laugh lines, that her mouth even in repose turned upward into a faint smile.
"I'm looking for someone. My wife, in fact. Deet Forska."
Her smile widened. She sat up. "You're the beloved Leyel."
It was an absurd thing for a stranger to say, but it pleased him nonetheless to realize that Deett must have spoken of him. Of course everyone would have known that Deet's husband was the Leyel Forska. But this woman hadn't said it that way, had she? Not as the Leyel Forska, the celebrity. No, here he was known as "the beloved Leyel." Even if this woman meant to tease him, Deet must have let it be known that she had some affection for him. He couldn't help but smile. With relief. He hadn't known that he feared the loss of her love so much, but now he wanted to laugh aloud, to move, to dance with pleasure.
"I imagine I am," said Leyel.
"I'm Zay Wax. Deet must have mentioned me, we have lunch every day."
No, she hadn't. She hardly mentioned anybody at the library, come to think of it. These two had lunch every day, and Leyel had never heard of her. "Yes, of course," said Leyel. "I'm glad to meet you."
"And I'm relieved to see that your feet actually touch the ground."
"Now and then."
"She works up in Indexing these days." Zay cleared her display.
"Is that on Trantor?"
Zay laughed. She typed in a few instructions and her display now filled with a map of the library complex. It was a complex pile of rooms and corridors, almost impossible to grasp. "This shows only this wing of the main building. Indexing is these four floors."
Four layers near the middle of the display turned to a brighter color.
"And here's where you are right now." A small room on the first floor turned white. Looking at the labyrinth between the two lighted sections, Leyel had to laugh aloud. "Can't you just give me a ticket to guide me?"
"Our tickets only lead you to places where patrons are allowed. But this isn't really hard, Lord Forska. After all, you're a genius, aren't you?"
"Not at the interior geography of buildings, whatever lies Deet might have told you."
"You just go out this door and straight down the corridor to the elevators-- can't miss them. Go up to fifteen. When you get out, turn as if you were continuing down the same corridor, and after a while you go through an archway that says 'Indexing." Then you lean back your head and bellow 'Deet' as loud as you can. Do that a few times and either she'll come or security will arrest you."
"That's what I was going to do if I didn't find somebody to guide me."
"I was hoping you'd ask me." Zay stood up and spoke loudly to the busy librarians. "The cat's going away. The mice can play."
"About time," one of them said. They all laughed. But they kept working.
"Follow me, Lord Forska."
"Leyel, please."
"Oh, you're such a flirt." When she stood, she was even shorter and fatter than she had looked sitting down. "Follow me."
They conversed cheerfully about nothing much on the way down the corridor. Inside the elevator, they hooked their feet under the rail as the gravitic repulsion kicked in. Leyel was so used to weightlessness after all these years of using elevators on Trantor that he never noticed. But Zay let her arms float in the air and sighed noisily. "I love riding the elevator," she said. For the first time Leyel realized that weightlessness must be a great relief to someone carrying as many extra kilograms as Zay Wax. When the elevator stopped, Zay made a great show of staggering out as if under a great burden. "My idea of heaven is to live forever in gravitic repulsion."
"You can get gravitic repulsion for your apartment, if you live on the top floor."
"Maybe you can," said Zay. "But I have to live on a librarian's salary." Leyel was mortified. He had always been careful not to flaunt his wealth, but then, he had rarely talked at any length with people who couldn't afford gravitic repulsion. "Sorry, " he said. "I don't think I could either, thege days."
"Yes, I heard you squandered your fortune on a real bang-up funeral."
Startled that she would speak so openly of it, he tried to answer in the same joking tone. "I suppose you could look at it that way."
"I say it was worth it," she said. She looked slyly up at him. "I knew Hari, you know. Losing him cost humanity more than if Trantor's sun went nova."
"Maybe," said Leyel. The conversation was getting out of hand. Time to be cautious.